I, Alastor
by eldritcher
Summary: Alastor Moody wants. Alastor Moody hates. Alastor Moody is.


Warnings: Violence, crude language, prisoner ill-treatment

* * *

I had worn my tartan, proud and fiery, and strode to her fearlessly. The boys and girls in the Common Room watched us quietly. The usual ruckus had fallen away with my approach. She did not look up from her Transfiguration textbook.

"Minerva, might I speak with you?" I asked.

When I had practised before my mirror, when I had practised before Charlus and Septimus, my voice had not faltered so. I had been as proud and fearless as any Scotsman born. Now my voice was slightly croaky. My palms were sweaty.

She looked up. Her spectacles were low on the bridge of her fine nose. Her eyes held no curiosity. She had the look of someone who had been disturbed from a favourite activity. Why did she love Transfiguration so, that she spent all her free time poring over texts and texts?

"Will you be my partner to the Ball?" I asked, softly, giving her the rose I had gone to great lengths to procure illegally, for it was close to winter and roses were not in season.

She sighed. It was a put-upon sigh.

"Please?" I asked. Scotsmen did not beg.

"Thank you, Alastor," she said quietly. She pointedly looked away from the rose I offered and returned to her reading.

Later, I shred the petals of the rose and blew them out of my dormitory window.

* * *

"This is your chance!" Charlus said brightly, as we prepared for the Ball. He did not seem overly affected by the excitement of the previous day.

Yesternite, Charlus and the others had gone to play a prank on the Slytherin girls. Dorea Black had turned down Charlus and he had been extremely angry at the gall of her. I was unsure why he had expected her to accept him as a partner for the Ball. Surely he had not imagined that she held a torch for him? Charlus was handsome and popular with the girls, but even his charms could not surpass the hatred between the Houses.

The prank had mixed results. Dumbledore had been supportive enough before Slughorn and the Slytherins, but later he had scolded us severely and threatened us with expulsion if we dared embark on such a prank again. The Slytherins, I heard, had taken the upstart Riddle to their bosom, for he had single-handedly saved their wenches from blight. Charlus had only intended it as a prank, but the Slytherins had seen monsters where there had been none. I suppose Riddle had a lucky day. Perhaps the bonhomie would keep him from lurking in the corridors at night. It was irritating since his Prefect status meant I could not take points off and report him to Dumbledore.

"Alastor?"

"Merely irritated," I said quietly. "They will feting Riddle for nothing."

"Let them," Septimus muttered. "He is hardly the charmer he pretends to be. They will drop the praising soon enough, once they see his true colours."

"I am off to meet Minerva. Have a good Ball!" I wished them, not interested in speaking of Riddle then.

"You look radiant!"

She did not. She had taken an effort to dress for the Ball. She was clad in plain black robes. Reminded me of Madam Pince, she did, with her frown and general air of discontentment. I suppressed a sigh. Had she expected somebody else to ask her out? Had she merely agreed to accompany me for politeness's sake?

"Let us go," she said. "I don't wish to be late for Professor Dumbledore's speech."

I trailed after her.

She was unreceptive to my attempts at striking conversation. I had thought that we would have much to speak of, from our common academic interests to our Scottish heritage. I had been wrong. I looked around. Charlus and the others seemed to be having a wonderful time with their company for the Ball. I felt disconsolate. I had worked on summoning my courage for weeks, to muster enough to ask for her company.

"Riddle dances exceedingly well," she remarked, as we sat beside each other. She had been watching the merry dancers too.

"Do you wish to dance?" I asked, desperate.

"No," she said shortly.

What did she want?

Professor Dumbledore came by and asked us, "Why aren't you dancing? Minerva, Alastor, do hurry to the dance floor. It is a very nice song."

I looked at Minerva. She seemed unmoved.

"Minerva," the Professor gently said. "Go dance. It would be a shame otherwise."

She sniffed and stood up. Then she looked at me imperiously. Glad for the Professor's intervention, I smiled at him and quickly tugged her to the dance floor.

It did not get better. She seemed to notice others more. In fact, she seemed to notice Riddle more. Riddle was dancing exceedingly well, as she had noted earlier. Perhaps he had finally received some dance tutoring, for I remembered him from Balls past and he had not been a dancer at all.

Did she like him? Was this a repeat of Charlus's obsession with Dorea?

"You seem preoccupied, Alastor."

Finally, she had deigned to speak to me.

"Did you hear of what had happened yesterday in the Slytherin dormitories?"

"I did. They deserve to be expelled, all of them."

She was furious. There were splotches of colour on her cheeks. What a girl!

* * *

One thing followed another, and before I knew it, by the end of the year, Charlus had taken his rivalry with Riddle to great heights. Professor Dumbledore was not unaware of this. Nobody was unaware of this.

Charlus came up with a harebrained idea. And it worked.

"Not so smart now, are you?" he taunted Riddle, as the gang rounded on him.

Seven to one. I did not think that was unfair odds. Riddle was a powerful wizard. I watched warily, prepared to alert someone should there be real danger.

Riddle, by virtue of whatever Potion clever Septimus had brewed, lay immobile. There was cold hatred in his eyes. It unsettled me. I wished that Charlus would bury the hatchet and let Riddle be. There was nothing to be gained in this. Riddle's star was on the rise. He would go into the Ministry and quickly rise through the ranks. It was inevitable. All these taunts and grudges of children might come back to haunt Charlus later. Slytherin had not loved Riddle. But now they did. There was a strangeness to him that did not bode well for those who disliked him.

They were now kicking him. I suppressed a wince as a malicious blow was aimed at his pelvic region. When the Potion began wearing off, they left. They had had their sport with him to their hearts's satisfaction certainly. I took off my Invisibility Cloak and made for Riddle.

He looked sharply at me. He was hurt and his reflexes were poor, but the awareness in his eyes was surpassed only by hatred.

"I will accompany you to the Hospital Wing," I said quietly. I did not offer him a hand. I did not think it would aid anything.

"Alastor," he said softly, his eyes blazing in anger and humiliation. "No rose will win you the bird. If you listen to her song, you will know it is not of you she sings. Whom does she listen to? Whom does she strive to please? Whom does she smile for?"

It was the last that struck me cold.

Minerva smiled only when one person complimented her on something. Minerva smiled only when Professor Dumbledore complimented her on something.

Riddle looked triumphant. I had never hated anyone as deeply as I hated Riddle then. I kicked him hard in the stomach multiple times. It felt good. It felt damn good. Panting and gasping and coughing blood, he still managed to smirk at me.

* * *

I chose my N.E. carefully. I would become an Auror. It was in my bloodline, after all.

I had often let myself be carried away by fanciful imagination. I had often let myself wonder if I might choose a scholastic career if that was what Minerva had wanted. I had not imagined a future where she would not be mine.

It sickened me. She smiled at the Professor as if he were the sun, the moon and the stars. She strove to please him, as eagerly as a dog pleases a master.

When I crossed Riddle in corridors, he would look at me. It was the knowing look of someone who knew exactly what his words had wrought.

* * *

In 1956, Tom Riddle killed Damocles McGonagall.

In 1956, Minerva joined Dumbledore at Hogwarts. Rumour spoke of their affair of passion. Some were scandalised. Some were joyous.

I was an Auror now and had no time to reflect on trifles of the heart. Tom Riddle had been busy. I remembered his smirk when he had shattered my heart with his carefully picked out words that day long ago. I would bring him down.

"Alastor!" Dumbledore said warmly, as he poured tea for me. "It is wonderful to see you! Of course, the Ministry would not have anyone other than you to lead the Aurors against the threat we face now."

The Ministry had promoted me. They could ill afford not to. Aurors were dying like flies, Riddle was nigh unstoppable and I had Dumbledore's patronage. I also had the reputation of being cruel and harsh with my prisoners. This approach, I found, led to more answers and more prisoners.

Minerva walked in as Dumbledore and I made short talk. Her hair was tied up in a tight bun. Her clothes concealed her thin body altogether. She had painted herself older than she was, with her hairstyle and with her dowdy clothes. She stood beside Dumbledore and did not meet my gaze. She seemed discomfited and out of sorts.

"Hello, Minerva," I greeted her quietly.

"Alastor, it is good to see you again. I hope you will join the Order. We could use somebody of your calibre to lead the attacks."

We join causes for different reasons. I knew that Riddle, despite Dumbledore on our side, would be incredibly hard to contain. I knew what I wanted to protect.

Dumbledore had his fingers steepled and his chin resting atop them. Wise man. His wisdom had not brooked him to shame when he had taken a student as a lover. Then there was Minerva herself, standing beside him, protectively, the Scottish pride and courage fiercely stamped on her austere features.

* * *

The work brought Dumbledore and I closer. It was hard to continually remind myself of what he had done. He treated me well. He called me a friend.

I found that caring waned with time. I was able to watch Minerva's longing looks at Dumbledore with more compassion as the days went by. She was not happy. Perhaps that was what stirred my compassion and quelled my resentment. I was unhappy too, and in her unhappiness I found solace, and with that I found in me compassion for her. Humans are pathetic.

In 1958, I ambushed the Death Eaters as they were revelling in their triumph after killing one of the Prewetts. For once, I had more manpower than they did. I knew we would win. Blood-lust soared high in me. In the beginning, the blood-lust had worried me. Then, the Aurors who trained me had told m that it was a consequence of using the Unforgivables. I tried to use them sparingly, but this was not an encounter where I would regret blood-lust.

"Sir! They have _Him _here!"

Strange. Riddle rarely stayed for revelries.

"Well?" I barked. "He is just one more man. Don't bother trying to get them Disarmed. He is too dangerous. Take them all down!"

We had him surrounded. He was desperate. I, who knew his spell-casting so well, could see that he was tiring and madly trying to look for escape.

It must have been a rookie bunch that he had been leading today. Most of them fought well, but not madly. I could sense their terror as they unleashed the Unforgivables for the first time outside practice sessions. It explained why Riddle had stayed with them. It explained his current desperation. He knew, as well as I did, that he was outmatched here.

"The ninth to the front!" I exclaimed, calling for the most seasoned veterans of my lot. Today would be a day Riddle would end in Azkaban or six foot under. I hoped it was six foot under.

Riddle recognised my voice. His eyes flared as he realised the danger of his position. He kept his wand admirably steady as he backed off slowly, trying to make for higher ground. He wanted to Apparate.

"Coward!" I taunted him. "Leaving fresh meat behind as Auror fodder! Stand and fight, Riddle!"

He snarled and conjured a huge serpent. He was going to be very sorry indeed for his theatrics. I Vanished his pathetic attempt at defence and steadily led my men on. We were closing in around him. If he tried to Apparate, he would have to remove his Shield Charm. He would be hit by our barrage of spells mid-Apparition. I grinned at the thought of him Splinched. One of our curses broke his Shield Charm. Only his extremely good reflexes saved him from the curses that followed.

"You do dance exceedingly well!" I taunted him again, as he spun and swerved to avoid our spells. He was casting, but there were too many of us.

"No!" exclaimed a terrified voice as Riddle swerved from a flash of green light that had emanated from my wand-tip.

A man in a dressing gown loosely-tied had Apparated right into the midst of the melee and was shooting curses left and right madly. His loose hair formed a flaming golden halo around his head as he shoved Riddle behind him, protecting the bastard with body and wand.

"Malfoy!" I cursed. The idiot did not even have a Shield Charm to protect him, but that did not matter. He was giving Riddle the time to Apparate away.

"Kill him!" I ordered my Aurors. "Kill him and take down Riddle. Now!"

Riddle had by then conjured a huge spinning ball of magic around them. He had always been talented at improvising magic. His spinning Shield made our curses ricochet off back at us. I cursed as he grabbed Malfoy close and Apparated away.

* * *

"Malfoy is the weak link," I told Dumbledore. "We can haul him in under some pretext or the other. Riddle cannot last."

"He is law-abiding," Dumbledore remarked. "What pretext could you haul him under?"

"I have twenty-five Aurors who can take the witness stand to rightly claim that Malfoy aided Riddle to escape at the encounter."

"What then?" Dumbledore asked wearily. "Abraxas is what keeps Tom sane. I don't want to find out what we will have unleashed on the Wizarding World should we harm Abraxas."

"Malfoy does nothing to temper the slaughter. He does nothing to contain Riddle. Dumbledore, I know you believe in the mystical superpowers of love, but I am telling you that Malfoy must go down if we are to get to Riddle and stop him while we still can."

"Why do you mock love, Alastor?" Dumbledore asked me gently.

"Love?" I laughed, amused. "Did you spare Grindelwald's lover too for the same reason? No, you did not even care to find out if he had one. You went ahead and duelled him and won. You liberated us. That is how we deal with Dark Lords."

He looked stung. Slowly, he asked, "What do you think Grindelwald surrendered to?"

"I beg your pardon?" I asked, my voice soft. I had seen the truth though, in the grief stamped bright and hollow on his aging features. He shook his head and muttered that he was going to call it a night. I let him leave.

I did not move against Abraxas. Instead, I spent some time at the Castle, on walks with Minerva. She spoke to me again and again of the thousand wonderful things that Albus did, as excitedly as a teenage girl pining over a man she adored from afar. I pitied her. How could I not, after having heard the confession about how Grindelwald was defeated? During one of those walks, I espied Abraxas Malfoy, looking desolate and wretched, making his way up to the Castle from the gates. Minerva was still enthusing over Albus Dumbledore's merits and had not noticed Malfoy. I wondered if Abraxas would betray.

"Did he?" I asked Dumbledore later.

He sighed and said bitterly, "No, and I did not think he would. We must bring down Tom while Abraxas is alive."

* * *

The status quo continued for years. Many joined us. There was Andromeda and her husband, seeking sanctuary from her mad sister. There were more Prewetts. There was Arthur Weasley. There was Sirius Black and his friends.

We did what we could, to stall the madness. Albus aged, Minerva waned and I fought. We were tired, all of us.

Then, finally in 1978, came to us Andromeda, with the news.

"Abraxas Malfoy is dying!"

This would turn the tide mercilessly in our favour.

Dumbledore visited him twice. First, he went accompanied with Minerva. The meeting achieved nothing, or so Minerva said later. But I knew Albus. He must have gleaned something.

"Will you accompany me on a sickbed visit?" he asked, weeks later, after Lucius Malfoy had departed to Rheims with his new bride. Abraxas was unlikely to be alive when his son returned.

I accompanied Albus to Malfoy Manor. The atmosphere was funereal, though the master of the Manor was yet alive. There were only House Elves attending the dying man. His relatives, after all, were all criminals on the run.

"Ah, Mr. Snape!" Albus said genially, as an ugly boy, who decidedly was not a House Elf despite his lack of charm, opened the door for us.

He looked at us suspiciously. Then he said, "I am under orders to not receive visitors. Mr. Malfoy is unwell."

"Will you please ask him if he might spare a minute?"

The boy scowled and strode off.

"Some bastard son?" I wondered.

"Hardly," Albus muttered. "Yet another orphan Abraxas decided to take an interest in. This one is merely addled, though, and not psychopathic."

"Some comfort that."

The boy returned to us and sulkily announced that Abraxas Malfoy would receive us. We followed him upstairs, through many corridors, until we reached the west wing. In my headquarters, I had pored over maps of the Manor often enough that I knew well the layout.

Sure enough, the boy led us to the door that I had marked as the master bedroom. He knocked once and entered.

"Severus, you may leave," Abraxas, now emaciated and a husk of the man he had been, ordered from the luxurious bed upon which he was prone.

"Are you sure?" the boy asked.

"Yes, of course!" The invalid mustered a weak laugh. The eyes still shone with vivacity that I remembered from my Hogwarts days. "Besides, if they intended harm, there is hardly anything you and I can do to defend ourselves against the greatest wizard and the greatest Auror of our times."

The boy rolled his eyes, but left us.

"He will eavesdrop," I announced.

"Yes," Abraxas agreed genially. "He is a curious teenager."

"I am sorry to see you so, Abraxas," Albus said quietly, moving to sit beside the sick man.

"You come on a personally momentous day," Abraxas said wryly. It was clear enough what occasion he referred to. He was on the threshold of death. He continued speaking, "I would request that you leave soon, Professor Dumbledore. I wish to die alone."

"You will not be alone," Albus said quietly, moving his hand in an intricate shape in the air. Magic pulsed dark and deep around us. I did not need anyone to explain whose mark the magic bore.

Abraxas did not reply.

"What will you do?" Albus asked him. "There is no more time."

Abraxas sighed and looked away.

"You realise what you have led us all to?" Albus continued, merciless. I wondered if using an Unforgivable on the dying man would have been more compassionate.

"I have taken steps," Abraxas wheezed, his breathing drawn and heavy.

The dark magic of Voldemort waned as something more arcane subdued it. It was something older than life itself. It was death, coming to collect Abraxas. I could hear the clattering of approaching footsteps outside in the corridor. Was it the boy who had somehow sensed death? Unlikely.

"Leave!" Abraxas begged, his eyes pleading for mercy. "I have taken steps, Dumbledore. Please leave."

Albus hesitated. I did not. I tugged him by the shoulder and quickly made for the door. A madman shoved us aside in his haste to get to the dying man and a young, ugly boy stood in the doorway tearful.

"Riddle!" Abraxas managed, wheezing. "S'agapo." He brought a shivering hand to trace Riddle's pale features and smiled.

"S'agapo," he murmured and closed his eyes.

Men of violence die violently. I had often wondered if I would die by the wand myself. Abraxas died gently, as gently as a leaf falling down from a tree in autumn's prime.

"Remarkable," said Albus Dumbledore, as he looked back at the sobbing man straddling Abraxas's corpse and kissing cold lips as if willing life to seep from him to the dead.

I closed the door behind us and guided Albus out. We walked quickly to the Apparition point.

* * *

Later, that night, Minerva came to me as I stood on the Astronomy Tower. I had been unable to sleep, my mind made restless by what I had seen that day.

"Albus refused to speak of the meeting."

Why did Albus try to keep her in the dark about everything that mattered? I did not know. I had asked him, and he had said something about protecting her.

"It was pointless," I told her. "He is dead now. We need to prepare for war."

I was right. When a turncoat came to us blubbering about the monster's plot to kill a babe newborn, I knew that Dumbledore had been right. Abraxas's death had snapped the last sane nerve.

* * *

After the monster's death, the cells in Azkaban were flush with Death Eaters awaiting trial. I had personal grudges against more than one of them. There was the man who had taken a chunk off my nose. There was the man who had taken my eye. There was the man who had taken my leg.

Minerva had looked horrified at my new eye. There had been a time when impressing her had been the sole purpose to everything I did.

"Prisoner 814 awaiting interrogation, Sir!"

814 was a special case. He merited special treatment. He was the one who had taken the news of the prophecy to Riddle.

"But I came back to tell Dumbledore as soon as I realised what I had done!" he begged, tears streaking a clean path down the grime on his ugly face.

I did not listen to him as I lifted my wand again.

* * *

"Alastor!" Minerva shouted. "How dare you do this to a young man who had spied upon the enemy at great personal cost?"

"Turncoats turn again, Minerva."

She was a fiery Scottish woman. I wanted her. Gone the drabness, gone the austerity, now there was only fire and anger in her. I wanted her. I clutched her arm as she continued her tirade. She stilled. There was only innocence and righteousness on her features. I let her go.

* * *

The turncoat killed Albus Dumbledore. I was sad that my friend was dead. I was worried as to what this would portend. I was grateful for another chance.

Not now, not until the war was over. If the war ended with us alive, I would speak to Minerva again of what had been festering in me for decades.

For now, we would be quiet and stoic, as we weathered the war and as we defended those Albus Dumbledore had wanted saved.


End file.
